1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to computer networks and to telephony. More particularly, this invention is directed to methods and systems for more efficient and effective communication and processing of incoming communications and other electronic data in a call management and contact center system for a healthcare center.
2. Description of the Related Art
Healthcare centers (physician's offices, hospitals, clinics, labs, diagnostic centers, medical record repositories, insurers, patients, pharmaceutical and surgical suppliers, and/or other healthcare vendors) commonly service patients through call management and contact centers (herein after referred to as a “call center”). These call centers are staffed with support agents, interactive voice response recordings, and/or information systems to process patient inquiries across numerous communications devices and network infrastructures. Each week, hundreds, if not thousands or more, of incoming communications (including calls, emails, faxes, letters, and other communications) and associated data are received, accessed, and/or managed by the call center. The agent (or an automated call forwarding system) may forward/transfer the incoming communications and/or associated data to an extension of a staff member who can respond to the patient. Alternatively, the agent (or an automated call forwarding system) may forward/transfer the incoming communications and/or associated data to an extension of a patient to receive and/or to respond to the incoming communication (and associated data). The extension is typically associated with a physical location of a phone, such as a phone in the staff member's office or a particular location in a building. Oftentimes, the staff member (or the patient) is unavailable to receive the incoming communication and/or associated data because the staff member is away from the phone or because the phone cannot display or otherwise provide the associated data. For example, if the staff member is a doctor working in a large hospital, the doctor may be located at numerous locations throughout the day, such as in-service patient floors for rounds and/or emergencies, conference rooms for meetings, and clinic rooms for appointments/consultation. Thus, the doctor travels to multiple locations at different times throughout the day as inpatient service loads, meeting times, clinic schedule changes, and other changes make it difficult to have a predictable schedule and location. While most doctors carry paging devices, these paging, devices tend to have limited service areas that restrict communications outside of a geographic area and limited functionality that restricts an incoming communication to a short text message such as a phone number. These paging devices also do not transmit communications and/or data back to the call center such as confirmations that the incoming communication was reviewed, location of the paging device (e.g., paging device of Dr. Roberts is located on 3rd floor/ICU section of Hawthorn building), and so on. Still further, most business people today tend to carry multiple communications devices, such as a pager, personal digital assistant (PDA), and cell phone. However, the call center of the healthcare center does not leverage the multiple communications devices of the staff member (and/or patient) because each of these communications devices is customized in terms of software, hardware, and network configuration. For example, the PDA and the cell phone have different software applications, data processing, storage, management, and communications systems.
As discussed above, one of the biggest barriers facing a call center is locating and accessing multiple communications devices utilized by the staff (and/or the patients) of the healthcare center. In addition, the incoming communications and associated data of the call center must be in a format that can easily be exchanged or otherwise shared with each communications device. For example, if the agent wants to share contact information (e.g., name, phone numbers, addresses, etc.) with a cell phone and a pager of a staff member, then the agent typically must enter this information twice—once on a platform communicating with the cell phone and once on a platform communicating with the pager. Another barrier is providing the incoming communication and/or associated data in a standardized or otherwise compatible data format, depending on functionality limitations of the communications device, so that each communications device has efficient and effective access to the information. For example, conventional wireless phones have limited functionality compared with personal computers (PC). Typically, wireless telephones provide limited contact information, such as a telephone listing by name rather than full address books and/or calendars. Additionally, conventional wireless telephones are unable to run application/software packages and may have limited capabilities for transmitting, receiving, and displaying video data.
In addition to the challenges of implementing a successful contact center that enables improved access to staff, patients, and or data, most healthcare centers must also comply with a variety of federal, state, local and other rules that protect the privacy and security of healthcare information associated with a patient. For example, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), signed into law by President Clinton on Aug. 21, 1996 (Pub. L. 104-191, 110 Stat. 1936), covers health plans, healthcare clearinghouses, and healthcare providers who conduct certain financial and administrative transactions (e.g., electronic billing and funds transfers) electronically. Providers (e.g., physicians, hospitals, etc.) and health plans are required to give patients a clear written explanation of how a covered entity may use and disclose a patient's healthcare information. Further, healthcare providers are required to obtain patient consent before sharing information for treatment, payment, and healthcare operations. In addition, HIPPA also requires that a provider adopt and implement privacy procedures to ensure the privacy and security of the healthcare information.
To further complicate operations of the call center, most healthcare centers must work with several vendors who each provide only a portion of the required call management and contact center system. Further, these healthcare centers often do not have the technical staff to design, select, and integrate network(s), hardware and equipment, software, and/or develop customized applications. Even after the healthcare center has purchased the required components, they have difficulty integrating these components into existing infrastructures, and most often, end up with several call centers that do not provide access to information and/or to staff (and/or patients) across the entire enterprise. As a result, healthcare centers limp along with many different, non-integrated communications networks and call center systems.
Accordingly, healthcare centers need integrated call management and contact center systems and methods that can provide immediate access to resources (e.g., staff and data) and patients, improve operator productivity, increase patient satisfaction, and control costs. The integrated call management and contact center systems and methods must support various communications infrastructures to capitalize on emerging communications devices such as, for example, interactive pagers, on-site pagers, wireless phones, personal computers, etc. Consequently, the integrated call management and contact center systems and methods should enable sharing, transferring, and/or accessing staff, data, and/or patients over various communications devices while also complying with information system requirements of the healthcare center, such as security/privacy and fail-safe requirements.